Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President

James A. Garfield may have been the most extraordinary man ever elected president. Born into abject poverty, he rose to become a wunderkind scholar, a Civil War hero, and a renowned and admired reformist congressman. Nominated for president against his will, he engaged in a fierce battle with the corrupt political establishment. But four months after his inauguration, a deranged office seeker tracked Garfield down and shot him in the back. But the shot didn’t kill Garfield. The drama of what hap­pened subsequently is a powerful story of a nation in tur­moil.

Hero of the Empire: The Boer War, a Daring Escape, and the Making of Winston Churchill

At age 24 Winston Churchill was utterly convinced it was his destiny to become prime minister of England one day, despite the fact he had just lost his first election campaign for Parliament. He believed that to achieve his goal, he had to do something spectacular on the battlefield. Despite deliberately putting himself in extreme danger as a British army officer in colonial wars in India and Sudan and as a journalist covering a Cuban uprising against the Spanish, glory and fame had eluded him.

Into Africa: The Epic Adventures of Stanley and Livingstone

"Dr. Livingstone, I presume?" So goes the signature introduction of New York Herald star journalist Henry Morton Stanley to renowned explorer Dr. David Livingstone, who had been missing for six years in the wilds of Africa. Into Africa ushers us into the meeting of these remarkable men. In 1866, when Livingstone journeyed into the heart of the African continent in search of the Nile's source, the land was rough, unknown to Europeans, and inhabited by man-eating tribes.

Skeletons on the Zahara: A True Story of Survival

Everywhere hailed as a masterpiece of historical adventure, this enthralling narrative recounts the experiences of 12 American sailors who were shipwrecked off the coast of Africa in 1815, captured by desert nomads, sold into slavery, and subjected to a hellish two-month journey through the bone-dry heart of the Sahara. The ordeal of these men - who found themselves tested by barbarism, murder, starvation, death, dehydration, and hostile tribes that roamed the desert on camelback - is made indelibly vivid in this gripping account of courage, brotherhood, and survival.

The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon

A sensational disappearance that made headlines around the world. A quest for truth that leads to death, madness or disappearance for those who seek to solve it. The Lost City of Z is a blockbuster adventure narrative about what lies beneath the impenetrable jungle canopy of the Amazon. After stumbling upon a hidden trove of diaries, acclaimed New Yorker writer David Grann set out to find out what happened to the British explorer Percy Fawcett and his quest for the Lost City of Z.

Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage

In August of 1914, the British ship Endurance set sail for the South Atlantic. In October, 1915, still half a continent away from its intended base, the ship was trapped, then crushed in the ice. For five months, Sir Ernest Shackleton and his men, drifting on ice packs, were castaways in one of the most savage regions of the world.

Jungle of Stone: The True Story of Two Men, Their Extraordinary Journey, and the Discovery of the Lost Civilization of the Maya

In 1839 rumors of extraordinary yet baffling stone ruins buried within the unmapped jungles of Central America reached two of the world's most intrepid travelers. Seized by the reports, American diplomat John Lloyd Stephens and British artist Frederick Catherwood sailed together out of New York Harbor on an expedition into the forbidding rainforests of present-day Honduras, Guatemala, and Mexico. What they found would rewrite the West's understanding of human history.

Island of the Lost: Shipwrecked at the Edge of the World

Auckland Island is a godforsaken place in the middle of the Southern Ocean, 285 miles south of New Zealand. With year-round freezing rain and howling winds, it is one of the most forbidding places in the world. To be shipwrecked there means almost certain death. In 1864, Captain Thomas Musgrave and his crew of four aboard the schooner Grafton wreck on the southern end of the island. Utterly alone in a dense coastal forest, plagued by stinging blowflies and relentless rain, Captain Musgrave inspires his men to take action.

Pirate Hunters: Treasure, Obsession, and the Search for a Legendary Pirate Ship

Finding and identifying a pirate ship is the hardest thing to do under the sea. But two men - John Chatterton and John Mattera - are willing to risk everything to find the Golden Fleece, the ship of the infamous pirate Joseph Bannister. While he was at large during the Golden Age of Piracy in the 17th century, Bannister's exploits would have been more notorious than Blackbeard's, more daring than Kidd's, but his story and his ship have been lost to time.

The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt

Described by the Chicago Tribune as "a classic," The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt stands as one of the greatest biographies of our time. The publication of The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt on September 14th, 2001, marked the 100th anniversary of Theodore Roosevelt becoming president.

Mornings on Horseback

Winner of the 1982 National Book Award for Biography, Mornings on Horseback is the brilliant biography of the young Theodore Roosevelt. Hailed as a masterpiece by Newsday, it is the story of a remarkable little boy -- seriously handicapped by recurrent and nearly fatal attacks of asthma -- and his struggle to manhood.

In the Kingdom of Ice: The Grand and Terrible Polar Voyage of the USS Jeannette

In the late nineteenth century, people were obsessed by one of the last unmapped areas of the globe: The North Pole. No one knew what existed beyond the fortress of ice rimming the northern oceans. On July 8, 1879, the USS Jeannette set sail from San Francisco to cheering crowds in the grip of "Arctic Fever." The ship sailed into uncharted seas, but soon was trapped in pack ice. Two years into the harrowing voyage, the hull was breached. Amid the rush of water and the shrieks of breaking wooden boards, the crew abandoned the ship.

Exploration Fawcett: Journey to the Lost City of Z

This is the true story of the real Colonel Fawcett, whose life was the inspiration for the best-selling book The Lost City of Z and an upcoming movie starring Brad Pitt. A thrilling account, it tells of Colonel Fawcett and his mysterious disappearance in the Amazon jungle, which is now considered one of the greatest mysteries of the 20th century.

Colonel Roosevelt

Of all our great presidents, Theodore Roosevelt is the only one whose greatness increased out of office. When he toured Europe in 1910 as plain “Colonel Roosevelt,” he was hailed as the most famous man in the world. Crowned heads vied to put him up in their palaces. “If I see another king,” he joked, “I think I shall bite him.”

American Kingpin: The Epic Hunt for the Criminal Mastermind Behind the Silk Road

In 2011, a 26-year-old libertarian programmer named Ross Ulbricht launched the ultimate free market: the Silk Road, a clandestine website hosted on the Dark Web where anyone could trade anything - drugs, hacking software, forged passports, counterfeit cash, poisons - free of the government's watchful eye. It wasn't long before the media got wind of the new website where anyone - not just teenagers and weed dealers but terrorists and black hat hackers - could buy and sell contraband detection-free.

Shadow Divers: Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of WWII

In 1991, acting on a tip from a local fisherman, two scuba divers discovered a sunken German U-boat, complete with its crew of 60 men, not too far off the New Jersey coast. The divers, realizing the momentousness of their discovery, began probing the mystery. Over the next six years, they became expert and well-traveled researchers, taught themselves German, hunted for clues in Germany, and constructed theories corrective of the history books, all in an effort to identify this sunken U-boat and its crew.

Roosevelt the Explorer: Teddy Roosevelt's Amazing Adventures as a Naturalist, Conservationist, and Explorer

No American president has been more enthusiastic in appreciating the wilderness and in conserving our nation’s natural treasures than Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919). And no other president wrote more about nature and his explorations of it than T. R., in scattered books, such as African Wilderness, and in his countless letters, including those collected in The Selected Letters of Theodore Roosevelt).

In Harm's Way: The Sinking of the U.S.S. Indianapolis and the Extraordinary Story of Its Survivors

On July 30, 1945, the USS Indianapolis was torpedoed in the South Pacific by a Japanese submarine. An estimated 300 men were killed upon impact; close to 900 sailors were cast into the Pacific Ocean, where they remained undetected by the navy for nearly four days and nights. Battered by a savage sea, they struggled to stay alive, fighting off sharks, hypothermia, and dementia. By the time rescue arrived, all but 317 men had died. The captain's subsequent court-martial left many questions unanswered

The Lost City of the Monkey God: A True Story

Since the days of conquistador Hernán Cortés, rumors have circulated about a lost city of immense wealth hidden somewhere in the Honduran interior, called the White City or the Lost City of the Monkey God. Indigenous tribes speak of ancestors who fled there to escape the Spanish invaders, and they warn that anyone who enters this sacred city will fall ill and die.

Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI

In the 1920s the richest people per capita in the world were members of the Osage Indian nation in Oklahoma. After oil was discovered beneath their land, they rode in chauffeured automobiles, built mansions, and sent their children to study in Europe. Then, one by one, the Osage began to be killed off. The family of an Osage woman, Mollie Burkhart, became a prime target. Her relatives were shot and poisoned. And it was just the beginning, as more and more members of the tribe began to die under mysterious circumstances.

American Buffalo: In Search of a Lost Icon

Steven Rinella won a lottery to hunt for a wild buffalo in the Alaskan wilderness. One of only four hunters that year who succeeded in killing a buffalo, he carried the carcass down a snow-covered mountainside and floated it four miles down a white-water canyon while being trailed by grizzly bears and suffering from hypothermia. Rinella found himself contemplating his own place among the 14,000 years' worth of buffalo hunters in North America and the place of the buffalo in the American consciousness.

The Professor and the Madman

Part history, part true-crime, and entirely entertaining, listen to the story of how the behemoth Oxford English Dictionary was made. You'll hang on every word as you discover that the dictionary's greatest contributor was also an insane murderer working from the confines of an asylum.

Meat Eater: Adventures from the Life of an American Hunter

Steven Rinella grew up in Twin Lake, Michigan, the son of a hunter who taught his three sons to love the natural world the way he did. As a child, Rinella devoured stories of the American wilderness, especially the exploits of his hero, Daniel Boone. He began fishing at the age of three and shot his first squirrel at eight and his first deer at thirteen. He chose the colleges he went to by their proximity to good hunting ground, and he experimented with living solely off wild meat. As an adult, he feeds his family from the food he hunts.

Audible Editor Reviews

Why we think it's Essential: It's a rare audiobook of any genre that keeps me on the edge of my seat. But a history book? Yet, as I listened to this impeccably researched biography/adventure, I could feel death around every bend of the Amazon. I really didn't know whether TR's quest for glory would be his last. Steve Feldberg

Publisher's Summary

At once an incredible adventure narrative and a penetrating biographical portrait, The River of Doubt is the true story of Theodore Roosevelt's harrowing exploration of one of the most dangerous rivers on earth.

The River of Doubt; it is a black, uncharted tributary of the Amazon that snakes through one of the most treacherous jungles in the world. Indians armed with poison-tipped arrows haunt its shadows; piranhas glide through its waters; boulder-strewn rapids turn the river into a roiling cauldron.

After his humiliating election defeat in 1912, Roosevelt set his sights on the most punishing physical challenge he could find, the first descent of an unmapped, rapids-choked tributary of the Amazon. Together with his son Kermit and Brazil's most famous explorer, Candido Mariano da Silva Rondon, Roosevelt accomplished a feat so great that many at the time refused to believe it. In the process, he changed the map of the western hemisphere forever.

Along the way, Roosevelt and his men faced an unbelievable series of hardships, losing their canoes and supplies to punishing whitewater rapids, and enduring starvation, Indian attack, disease, drowning, and a murder within their own ranks. Three men died, and Roosevelt was brought to the brink of suicide. The River of Doubt brings alive these extraordinary events in a powerful nonfiction narrative thriller that happens to feature one of the most famous Americans who ever lived.

From the soaring beauty of the Amazon rain forest to the darkest night of Theodore Roosevelt's life, here is Candice Millard's dazzling debut.

What the Critics Say

"Millard...nails the suspense element of this story perfectly, but equally important to her success is the marvelous amount of detail she provides on the wildlife that Roosevelt and his fellow explorers encountered on their journey, as well as the cannibalistic indigenous tribe that stalked them much of the way." (Publishers Weekly)

This work is a must listen for anyone interested in TR, Amazonia, tropical diseases, eqauatorial rainforests and the living things in them. In retrospect, this beautifully read work is brilliant because of its sheer depth and breadth. Every wound, sliver, bird, native and whitewater rumble is there for the listener to imbibe. Nearly every unique personality of the expedition party is woven into the this tale of naive and brash exploration. If you listen carefully you can be with them in the jungle without risk.

River of Doubt is a must read for enthusiasts of Teddy Roosevelt, but the story would work even without him. Candice Millard has written a book not only about an interesting phase in Roosevelt's extraordinary life, but also about an extraordinary part of the world: the Amazon. It is a compelling story told well and read extremely well by Paul Michael, who has narrated such other excellent books as Mountains Beyond Mountains. I highly recommend this book.

Once in a great while, I come across a book on Audible that deserves a very wide readership (if that is the right term for what we do). This is just one of those cases. Candice Millard has done a superb job in writing a very approachable book, in a breezy and informative fashion. The narrator is outstanding as well.

This is one of those books that combines biography, history, natural sciences, anthropology/ethnography with an adventure story. Millard does a great job in just a few passages characterizing TR -- part historian, part renaissance man, part hero, along with his less endearing attributes of being a blabbermouth, bits of excessive pride, mixed with not alittle hyperactivity disorder and alittle foolishness. She also provides good biographical information on TR's Brazilian co-leader of the expedition & TR's son Kermit, who came along on the trip a bit under duress, to take care of a father who was already visibly ailing.

In today's world, a world in which such exploration stories are rare, you can imagine TR going bungee jumping in his 50s, while on an exploration tour of the North Slope of Alaska in mid-winter. Or perhaps traveling out to the international space station (on someone else's dollar) and spending much time talking to us back on earth via a TV circuit.

This history reads like a novel. It will keep you sitting in the driveway with the motor running, or riding past your exit on the subway, just to keep listening. I had not heard of this Roosevelt expedition before - great investigative and storytelling work by a first time author. NYT and Washington Post just named this book among the top nonfiction books for 2005! P.S. I have NOT been paid for this indorsement - I'm a fan a great history told well, and this book is GREAT!

The story of Theodore Roosevelt's dark 1914 journey down the Amazon tributary, the River of Doubt is incredible. While I am tempted to compare this to Ernest Shackleton's Endurance odyssey, the latter's expedition took place around the same time in history, it was in fact a much more protracted one that lasted years and not just months. This is a book that combines biography, social and natural sciences, anthropology and exploration rolled into an exciting adventure story. We learn a great deal about TR the renaissance man, hero, and not always so admirable father. We also come to learn about another rather remarkable co-leader of the expedition, the Brazilian, Candido Rondon. He for me was one to be even more admired and respected particularly with regard to his leadership and relationship with the indigenous people of the the Amazon.

The book is beautifully written and narrated. It is a book that I hope is destined to become a classic. It deserves that much praise.

When I first read the subject matter of this book, my interest was piqued. I didn't know much about Teddy Roosevelt, much less that after his presidency he travelled on a dangerous expedition down an uncharted tributary of the Amazon River.
This book lived up to my expectations. Very well researched and written, it brought back to life a real adventure story, complete with all the trials of a fictional novel with as many twists as the actual River of Doubt.
As a bonus, I found the discussions regarding the ecosystems of the rain forest fascinating. After all, the purpose of this expedition was scientific in nature.
Excellent listen, very entertaining and informative.

Enough has already been said eloquently by the other reviewers so I'll just say you will miss a truly great book if you dont catch this one. I work in a bookstore and recommend it to my customers. None have been disappointed.

The story sounded promising, but like another reviewer, I was hoping for more narrative and story, and a little less science. This felt less like a story or documentary, and more like a scientific paper. Still a good read, but goes into overly detailed analysis of flora and fauna - some of which is obviously not specifically from the Roosevelt expedition and from our more modern general knowledge of the rain forest. It felt like: journal entry - textbook excerpt - journal entry - textbook excerpt - stop - start - etc. I would have to say the story telling felt choppy and could have woven into the rainforest background better. More detail about the actual expedition and the struggles they faced would have been nice. To the author's credit, in a day without cell phones, telephones, aircraft, vehicles of any kind, or cameras, I'm sure the material to draw on was extremely limited, having to rely solely on written accounts in a place and time where illiteracy must have been rampant. Get the book - just don't have the expectation you will be spellbound by Roosevelt's adventure.

I enjoyed this adventure and learned about an episode in history that was new to me, and also a great deal about the Amazon forest. The research done by the author was exhaustive and added great depth to the story. I appreciated the detailed descriptions of the main characters, the ecology of the forest and the native people, placing the story in a solid context and allowing me to create a mental vision of the trip as it progressed. As some other reviewers have commented, some additional editing of repetitive details may have tightened up the narrative some and kept things moving a little better, which is why I have given 4 instead of 5 stars. The narration was excellent and well suited to the material.

This is a spectacular book. The author did a fantastic job in bringing together adventure, history and a little bit of science, with a very good narrative and great character development. In fact, it would make a terrific "Indiana Jones-style" movie.

As a Brazilian, I have always admired Candido Rondon as a true hero, and this book only confirmed my admiration. Even in Brazil very few people know much about the Rondon-Roosevelt expedition. Contrary to my initial assumptions, I learned that Roosevelt's trip to Brazil was not a mere "celebrity safari", but a real scientific expedition with scientific added value. The "River of Doubt" (now called River Roosevelt) in the Amazon basin was uncharted until 1914 and it is as big as the Rhine.

The narrator also did a great job - he clearly made the effort of researching the correct prounciation of the names in Portuguese.